Russia

MOSCOW, April 1. /TASS/: The OSCE Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) in Ukraine has no longer been able to perform its former functions in the current political and legal circumstances, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Friday in a statement on the termination of the OSCE SMM activities.

MOSCOW, April 1. /TASS/: Russia’s decision to exit the Council of Europe was long in the making and shouldn’t be directly tied to the situation in Ukraine, Grigory Lukyantsev, the Russian Foreign Ministry’s human rights envoy told TASS.

"It wouldn’t be absolutely right to tie our decision to withdraw from the Council of Europe to what is happening in Ukraine," he said in an interview. "It's no secret that this decision had been in the making for a long time."

MOSCOW/KIEV, April 1 (Xinhua) -- A fire broke out at an oil depot in the Russian city of Belgorod after two Ukrainian military helicopters attacked the fuel storage facility, Vyacheslav Gladkov, governor of the Belgorod Region, said Friday.

Hours later, spokesman for the Ukrainian Defense Ministry Olexandr Motuzyanyk said he does not confirm or deny the information about Ukraine's involvement in the fire at the oil depot in Russia's Belgorod, the Interfax-Ukraine news agency reported.

(AP) --- A fiery explosion rocked a Russian fuel depot near the border around dawn Friday, and Moscow said Ukraine had attacked the facility, but Kyiv denied any involvement. There was no independent confirmation of details about the incident.

Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said two Ukrainian Mi-24 helicopters had entered Russian airspace “at an extremely low altitude” and attacked the civilian oil storage facility on the outskirts of the city of Belgorod.

MOSCOW, March 31. /TASS/: Cosmonaut Alexander Misurkin, who became the first special correspondent aboard the International Space Station (ISS) representing TASS news agency, is retiring from the team of Russian cosmonauts, the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center said in a statement on Thursday.

"Today, on March 31, 2022, Alexander Misurkin is on his last official day of work at the cosmonaut training center," the statement reads. "He is wrapping up his career as part of the Roscosmos [the Russian Space Agency] team of cosmonauts."

MOSCOW, March 31. /TASS/: If gas buyers from unfriendly states refuse to pay for gas in rubles, Russia will view it as breach of contract, President Vladimir Putin said at the meeting on the situation in the aviation sector.

"If such [ruble] payments are not made, we will consider this to be the buyers’ failure to perform commitments with all ensuing implications," Putin said.

Putin signed earlier today the decree stipulating acceptance of payments for gas in rubles.

MOSCOW, March 31 (Xinhua) -- Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on Thursday on new rules of natural gas trade with "unfriendly" countries and regions, vowing to halt existing contracts if these buyers refuse to pay in rubles.

"Today I signed a decree ... To purchase Russian natural gas, they must open ruble accounts in Russian banks. It is these accounts that will be used to pay for the gas supplies, starting April 1," Putin told a government meeting.

MOSCOW, March 30. /TASS/: Russia’s COVID-19 case tally rose by 20,145 over the past day to 17,823,648, the anti-coronavirus crisis center reported on Wednesday.

In relative terms, the growth rate reached 0.11%.

As many as 4,299 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 in Russia over the past day, down 12.8% from a day earlier. The number of hospitalized patients decreased in 52 regions, while in 31 regions the figure increased. The situation remained unchanged in two regions. A day earlier, 4,932 people were rushed to hospitals.

KOROLYOV /Moscow Region/, March 30. /TASS/: The Soyuz MS-19 spacecraft’s capsule carrying cosmonauts Anton Shkaplerov and Pyotr Dubrov and NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei landed in Kazakhstan.

Rescue crews have been dispatched to the landing site to help the crew members to get out of the capsule.

MOSCOW, March 30. /TASS/: The West fails to globally bound Russia as the country was ready for sanctions, Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev believes.

"Of course, there are real difficulties, which Russia has to cope with, as we are still being isolated from global value-added chains, the international division of labor, facing growing unemployment and being sent into an economic turmoil," he wrote on his Telegram channel on Wednesday.